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pboylan
20th August 2013, 22:49
I wrote this blog post in response to a question from a guy on an Aikido forum. I wondered what people here might think about it.

http://budobum.blogspot.com/2013/08/is-it-still-aikido-iaidojodowhatever-if.html

Chris Li
21st August 2013, 06:13
Also being discussed on Aikiweb... :)

http://www.aikiweb.com/forums/showthread.php?p=329090

Best,

Chris

Cady Goldfield
21st August 2013, 14:06
Peter is casting his bread upon the waters in hopes of cultivating discussions in many places.
Keeping up with all of those far-flung threads might provide some training in multi-tasking! ;)

pgsmith
21st August 2013, 16:46
Peter also put it on iaido-L. :)

My personal opinion is that you can't change something that radically, and still have it be the same thing. Aikido (iaido, jodo, etc ...) is a Japanese art that uses all of the traditional Japanese trappings. Remove the trappings, and you are no longer practicing aikido, you are doing something that uses the same principles as aikido.

Since I really do like analogies, here's the one that I presented for it on iaido-L ... Trying to do aikido without all of the cultural trappings would be like trying to learn how to waltz, except with different timing, different music, and different steps. If you have different timing, music, and steps, you would no longer be learning the waltz. You may still be dancing, but it would be an entirely different dance. In that case, why would you even wish to try and call your different dance the waltz?

Chris Li
21st August 2013, 16:58
Peter also put it on iaido-L. :)

My personal opinion is that you can't change something that radically, and still have it be the same thing. Aikido (iaido, jodo, etc ...) is a Japanese art that uses all of the traditional Japanese trappings. Remove the trappings, and you are no longer practicing aikido, you are doing something that uses the same principles as aikido.

Since I really do like analogies, here's the one that I presented for it on iaido-L ... Trying to do aikido without all of the cultural trappings would be like trying to learn how to waltz, except with different timing, different music, and different steps. If you have different timing, music, and steps, you would no longer be learning the waltz. You may still be dancing, but it would be an entirely different dance. In that case, why would you even wish to try and call your different dance the waltz?

I suspect that very few of us speak German while doing the waltz, even though it originated in Germany, and I suspect that very few of us dress the way that they did when the waltz originated in the 16th century. Does that analogy really stand up?

If the music, timing and steps are the same, what does it matter what you're wearing, or if you curtsey afterwards (which I suspect that very few people do either)?

Best,

Chris

pgsmith
21st August 2013, 19:30
I suspect that very few of us speak German while doing the waltz, even though it originated in Germany, and I suspect that very few of us dress the way that they did when the waltz originated in the 16th century. Does that analogy really stand up?

If the music, timing and steps are the same, what does it matter what you're wearing, or if you curtsey afterwards (which I suspect that very few people do either)?

Best,

Chris

If you'll read my post, my analogy specifically said that the music, timing, and steps are different. Why then would you say they are the same? Either use my analogies the way I built them, or don't be lazy and build your own! :)

To my mind, if you wish to do aikido, then learn aikido. If you wish to learn joint locks and redirection of energy without the Japanese phrases and etiquette, then aikido is not what you're after, since it uses Japanese phrases and etiquette. It is the same with folks that buy a Japanese style sword and cut things up in their backyard. They cannot say they are practicing iaido when they do that because iaido encompasses much more than simply taking a sword and cutting things up in the backyard.

Chris Li
21st August 2013, 19:46
If you'll read my post, my analogy specifically said that the music, timing, and steps are different. Why then would you say they are the same? Either use my analogies the way I built them, or don't be lazy and build your own! :)

To my mind, if you wish to do aikido, then learn aikido. If you wish to learn joint locks and redirection of energy without the Japanese phrases and etiquette, then aikido is not what you're after, since it uses Japanese phrases and etiquette. It is the same with folks that buy a Japanese style sword and cut things up in their backyard. They cannot say they are practicing iaido when they do that because iaido encompasses much more than simply taking a sword and cutting things up in the backyard.

Because I thought the analogy was inaccurate. It's like saying "if you're doing something different than it's different".

In reality, nobody uses the etiquette and clothing that people originally used when waltzing - but it's still waltzing, isn't it?

So...if Morihei Ueshiba practiced outside of the dojo in normal clothing without the normal etiquette (and he did this quite often) - that wouldn't be Aikido?

Why is it Aikido if I speak Japanese - but the exact same thing is not Aikido if I speak English?

Best,

Chris

Andrew S
21st August 2013, 21:16
It's aikido, Jim, but not as we know it. :D

Maybe what makes it aikido, iaido, karatedo (Funakoshi's Karatedo My Way of Life suggests that no special practice uniform is needed), etc. is the intent or heart. The formalisation of uniforms, etiquette, dojo, etc. are means to help us focus on that intent.

pgsmith
21st August 2013, 21:29
In reality, nobody uses the etiquette and clothing that people originally used when waltzing - but it's still waltzing, isn't it?
And this is relevant to the discussion how? Despite your insistence on trying to tie them together, aikido has no relation to waltzing unless your training was really bad. :)


So...if Morihei Ueshiba practiced outside of the dojo in normal clothing without the normal etiquette (and he did this quite often) - that wouldn't be Aikido?
Why would you ask a patently ridiculous question like that? Why would it matter what he practiced in?


Why is it Aikido if I speak Japanese - but the exact same thing is not Aikido if I speak English?
Again, that is a rather obviously false statement. You seem to be determined to misunderstand what is being said, and I am a bit perplexed as to why that is. I'll try and put it in the simplest terms possible in hopes that you'll understand this time ... You cannot learn aikido unless you go to an aikido dojo and someone teaches you aikido. Aikido is taught using Japanese terminology and etiquette. Therefore, you cannot learn aikido without the Japanese terminology and etiquette.

If you are indeed teaching aikido without using Japanese terminology or etiquette, then I will apologize and admit my mistake.

Chris Li
21st August 2013, 21:53
And this is relevant to the discussion how? Despite your insistence on trying to tie them together, aikido has no relation to waltzing unless your training was really bad. :)

OK - I didn't bring up the analogy, you did, and I followed along, so I'm a little confused here...:confused:



Why would you ask a patently ridiculous question like that? Why would it matter what he practiced in?

Because the OP's argument is that the clothing and other trappings are essential requirements for practice of the art...



Again, that is a rather obviously false statement. You seem to be determined to misunderstand what is being said, and I am a bit perplexed as to why that is. I'll try and put it in the simplest terms possible in hopes that you'll understand this time ... You cannot learn aikido unless you go to an aikido dojo and someone teaches you aikido. Aikido is taught using Japanese terminology and etiquette. Therefore, you cannot learn aikido without the Japanese terminology and etiquette.

If you are indeed teaching aikido without using Japanese terminology or etiquette, then I will apologize and admit my mistake.

Time for you to apologize then.:D

Not that we do it that way all the time, but we certainly do teach often enough with no Japanese terminology or etiquette.

Best,

Chris

pgsmith
21st August 2013, 22:53
Time for you to apologize then.

Not that we do it that way all the time, but we certainly do teach often enough with no Japanese terminology or etiquette.
In that case, I apologize. I never imagined that anyone had translated all of the terminology into English and was teaching aikido without using any of the Japanese terminology and etiquette. Just out of curiosity what do you call it, since the term "Aikido" is itself a Japanese term and you say you don't use Japanese terminology? Hmmm ... if it was not called aikido, then could it really be said to be aikido?

pgsmith
21st August 2013, 22:58
Because the OP's argument is that the clothing and other trappings are essential requirements for practice of the art...
Sorry, I forgot to address this one.
This is an incorrect statement. Peter's original blog post begins with the question "How important (or unimportant) do folks here feel Japanese customs are important to learning Aikido?"

If you'll notice, it doesn't say for practicing aikido, it says for learning aikido.

Chris Li
21st August 2013, 23:08
In that case, I apologize. I never imagined that anyone had translated all of the terminology into English and was teaching aikido without using any of the Japanese terminology and etiquette. Just out of curiosity what do you call it, since the term "Aikido" is itself a Japanese term and you say you don't use Japanese terminology? Hmmm ... if it was not called aikido, then could it really be said to be aikido?

Since were being picky, "Aikido" is a proper name rather than "terminology". In any case, as I said above there are plenty of times when we do use Japanese etiquette and terminology, just as there are plenty of times when we don't. IMO, it's really impossible to segregate those into "Aikido because we're speaking Japanese" and "not Aikido because we're speaking English".

Best,

Chris

Chris Li
21st August 2013, 23:10
Sorry, I forgot to address this one.
This is an incorrect statement. Peter's original blog post begins with the question "How important (or unimportant) do folks here feel Japanese customs are important to learning Aikido?"

If you'll notice, it doesn't say for practicing aikido, it says for learning aikido.

That's true, although he talks about "practice" and "training" in the article that he's talking about. Anyway, I'm not sure what your point is.

Best,

Chris

Cady Goldfield
21st August 2013, 23:15
Customs and rituals, and using terminology in the art's founding culture, can create an atmosphere and mood that some find desirable, but body method is body method, and, IMO, does not need to be couched in any kind of cultural mystique to be inculcated.

As to whether Aikido is still Aikido if you take away those cultural trappings... I dunno, is it a package deal? Maybe when you strip away the Japanese acoutrement, it becomes American Aikido, or British Aikido, or whatever. How about baseball? The Japanese have adopted it as their own, this American-as-apple-pie sport, and have their own rituals and approaches to the game now. Is it still baseball? Can Japanese kids learn baseball without using American-English terminology, uniforms, etc.?

pgsmith
21st August 2013, 23:37
That's true, although he talks about "practice" and "training" in the article that he's talking about. Anyway, I'm not sure what your point is.


I tried to simplify it as much as I possibly could, and I can't figure out how to make it simpler for you. If you can't figure it out, I guess you'll just have to stop attempting to argue against it. My point is the same as it has been since I first wrote it down; it is impossible to learn aikido, iaido, jodo, etc ... without learning the terminology and etiquette as they are taught as part of the art. Nobody teaches these arts without the cultural trappings, so you can't learn it that way.

gendzwil
22nd August 2013, 00:17
I tried to simplify it as much as I possibly could, and I can't figure out how to make it simpler for you. If you can't figure it out, I guess you'll just have to stop attempting to argue against it. My point is the same as it has been since I first wrote it down; it is impossible to learn aikido, iaido, jodo, etc ... without learning the terminology and etiquette as they are taught as part of the art. Nobody teaches these arts without the cultural trappings, so you can't learn it that way.Your argument is pointless as Chris points out, because if we accept it then there is no debate at all. Aikido can never be aikido without bowing, because you define bowing and every other thing unrelated to the waza as necessary to Aikido. But the question is whether all the cultural trappings are necessary to Aikido, so you have to imagine the techniques of Aikido taught outside the current cultural environment of Aikido.

Chris Li
22nd August 2013, 00:17
I tried to simplify it as much as I possibly could, and I can't figure out how to make it simpler for you. If you can't figure it out, I guess you'll just have to stop attempting to argue against it. My point is the same as it has been since I first wrote it down; it is impossible to learn aikido, iaido, jodo, etc ... without learning the terminology and etiquette as they are taught as part of the art. Nobody teaches these arts without the cultural trappings, so you can't learn it that way.

As I pointed out before, that's incorrect (about the "nobody teaches" part). So you can, certainly.

Best,

Chris

pgsmith
22nd August 2013, 01:13
Your argument is pointless as Chris points out, because if we accept it then there is no debate at all. Aikido can never be aikido without bowing, because you define bowing and every other thing unrelated to the waza as necessary to Aikido. But the question is whether all the cultural trappings are necessary to Aikido, so you have to imagine the techniques of Aikido taught outside the current cultural environment of Aikido.

But that is my point Neil, there is no debate at all. To my way of thinking, all the cultural trappings are necessary to Aikido (iaido, jodo etc ...) because you can't learn it without them. It's impossible to separate the physical techniques from the actual learning of them because, at this point in time, they are inextricably intertwined.

Despite what Chris keeps insisting, I would be willing to put money on the fact that I could go up to anyone in his class and ask them what shionage is and they would be able to tell me. Because, even though it is a Japanese term and he insists he is teaching his aikido without the use of Japanese terminology, it is a part of aikido and you can't learn the one without the other.

Cady Goldfield
22nd August 2013, 01:20
Despite what Chris keeps insisting, I would be willing to put money on the fact that I could go up to anyone in his class and ask them what shionage is and they would be able to tell me. Because, even though it is a Japanese term and he insists he is teaching his aikido without the use of Japanese terminology, it is a part of aikido and you can't learn the one without the other.

But you could also go up to to anyone in his class and ask them what "four-directional throw" is, and they would be able to tell you, I believe.

Chris Li
22nd August 2013, 01:36
But that is my point Neil, there is no debate at all. To my way of thinking, all the cultural trappings are necessary to Aikido (iaido, jodo etc ...) because you can't learn it without them. It's impossible to separate the physical techniques from the actual learning of them because, at this point in time, they are inextricably intertwined.

Despite what Chris keeps insisting, I would be willing to put money on the fact that I could go up to anyone in his class and ask them what shionage is and they would be able to tell me. Because, even though it is a Japanese term and he insists he is teaching his aikido without the use of Japanese terminology, it is a part of aikido and you can't learn the one without the other.

You'd lose your money. :D

Anyway, you still haven't given a reason as to why they must be inextricably intertwined. Peter has posed what is mostly a hypothetical question. What is your reason for believing that that such a thing is not possible?

Best,

Chris

gendzwil
22nd August 2013, 15:24
But that is my point Neil, there is no debate at all. To my way of thinking, all the cultural trappings are necessary to Aikido (iaido, jodo etc ...) because you can't learn it without them.OK, if I do za-rei old-style with left hand placed first and you do it with them together, are we doing a different budo or the same? Are the beginners in aikido doing a different budo because they are wearing sweatpants or zubon rather than hakama? Where's the cutoff between what is real budo and what is surface gloss?

pgsmith
22nd August 2013, 17:17
You'd lose your money. :D

Anyway, you still haven't given a reason as to why they must be inextricably intertwined. Peter has posed what is mostly a hypothetical question. What is your reason for believing that that such a thing is not possible?

Best,

Chris

You are still misunderstanding. I never said that they had to be intertwined, I simply asserted that they were intertwined. It is still my assertion that nobody has taken the great amount of effort necessary to remove the essence and underlying principles of aikido, or iaido, or jodo from their Japanese cultural roots. Of course, you keep trying to get me to believe that you've done this (I'm not sure why) but you'll just have to excuse me if I refuse to believe you. If you can show me a yondan (excuse me, I mean fourth degree black belt) in aikido that doesn't know how to properly do zarei and doesn't know the Japanese phrases or the etiquette involved in aikido, and then I'll believe you.

Those folks that I know that have studied any of these arts long enough to have some real understanding of the underlying principles do not have any real interest in trying to eliminate the cultural trappings that go along with them. I've been involved in several seminars for law enforcement and security personnel in which some aiki techniques were taught without any of the cultural trappings involved in aikido. However, these were simply a few aikido related techniques, and it couldn't be said that any of these seminars actually taught aikido per se.


OK, if I do za-rei old-style with left hand placed first and you do it with them together, are we doing a different budo or the same? Are the beginners in aikido doing a different budo because they are wearing sweatpants or zubon rather than hakama? Where's the cutoff between what is real budo and what is surface gloss?
None of that affects the training at all. However, those beginners are going to have to get at least a dogi, and most likely a hakama eventually. Not because they cannot learn without these things, but because these things are going to be required by their dojo. This is the same way that eventually, those beginners will have to acquire some knowledge of the Japanese phraseology used in aikido. Not because the movements cannot be described in English, but because nobody of high enough ranking is going to bother to instruct them to a high ranking without their learning the Japanese names for things.

It's not that it's theoretically impossible, it's that it is literally impossible.

cxt
22nd August 2013, 17:40
pboylan/Chris Li

Interesting read.

What I would ask is that you (only because you guys started the thread) define the terms needed to have the discussion. Mostly because its seems to me to be the preceptions of the those involved seems to be where the misunderstandings are coming from.

So it might be helpful to define things from the get-go, such as what to you is "aikido?"

We often have people that object to learning various Japanese/Okinanwan terms in karate--they usually get told:

1-All, that's ALL hobbies/avocations/jobs/etc have a specific jargon--from birdwatching to zoology and to a certain extent, if you want to be taken seriously and want to really understand the activity then you must learn a certain amount of the jargon.

Plus--nobody BMS (bitches, moans and whines) about having to learn equally weird terms in golf, tennis or basketball etc.

("sure I'd love join your foursome--just let me wash my balls first"; "lay-up"; "love"; "bogey" etc.)

And in some cases the jargon is important--I rock climb and I refuse to rope myself to someone that does not know what a "biner" might be and has no idea what do when I scream "be-lay."

2-The translation of many of the Japanese terms is often going to be just as stilted and strange as using the Japanese to start with. Such as "do an inside going out, palms up, middle block." Sure its in English--but does that really help all that much? ;)


Another way to look at it--again from a karate POV--can you still be doing "karate" without gi's, the japanese terms, the bowing rituals, etc.

Well....the okinawans who developed it certainly did. :)

Like I said--interesting discussion.

Chris Li
22nd August 2013, 17:53
You are still misunderstanding. I never said that they had to be intertwined, I simply asserted that they were intertwined. It is still my assertion that nobody has taken the great amount of effort necessary to remove the essence and underlying principles of aikido, or iaido, or jodo from their Japanese cultural roots. Of course, you keep trying to get me to believe that you've done this (I'm not sure why) but you'll just have to excuse me if I refuse to believe you. If you can show me a yondan (excuse me, I mean fourth degree black belt) in aikido that doesn't know how to properly do zarei and doesn't know the Japanese phrases or the etiquette involved in aikido, and then I'll believe you.

You seem bent on insisting that I'm lying - all the while moving the bar for your examples. Well I'll bow (or maybe not bow, but something equivalent) out here.

Best,

Chris

pboylan
22nd August 2013, 18:33
OK, if I do za-rei old-style with left hand placed first and you do it with them together, are we doing a different budo or the same? Are the beginners in aikido doing a different budo because they are wearing sweatpants or zubon rather than hakama? Where's the cutoff between what is real budo and what is surface gloss?

Neil,

That is exactly what I am getting at. I do some arts where it is important how you move your hands when you bow because it is an outward signal of what kind of attitude you are to be carrying internally. How you move your hands when you bow doesn't have to be that important, but in some arts it is. I was hoping to get into a discussion of what is important in various arts. It seems though that aikido (and likely karate) have become so diffused by the innumerable splits that have happened that they are huge classes of things that include so much variation they may not really be suitable for this discussion.

gendzwil
22nd August 2013, 18:35
It's not that it's theoretically impossible, it's that it is literally impossible.Paul, you are being unusually obtuse. The point of the discussion is not what is currently taught, but how much of it comprises Aikido (or Iaido or whatever other budo). You say "all of it", I say back up your assertion with something other than "because that's the only way it is currently taught".

pgsmith
23rd August 2013, 01:06
Neil,

That is exactly what I am getting at. I do some arts where it is important how you move your hands when you bow because it is an outward signal of what kind of attitude you are to be carrying internally. How you move your hands when you bow doesn't have to be that important, but in some arts it is. I was hoping to get into a discussion of what is important in various arts. It seems though that aikido (and likely karate) have become so diffused by the innumerable splits that have happened that they are huge classes of things that include so much variation they may not really be suitable for this discussion.

I concur Peter. I think that the koryu would probably be a better area, but then it would tend to limit the responses. Sorry for taking this one in a different direction, I just have a tendency to see things differently.

pgsmith
23rd August 2013, 01:18
Paul, you are being unusually obtuse. The point of the discussion is not what is currently taught, but how much of it comprises Aikido (or Iaido or whatever other budo). You say "all of it", I say back up your assertion with something other than "because that's the only way it is currently taught".

I am not being obtuse, I am simply seeing the objective from a different perspective. It may not be what you chose to see in the original question, but it was how I saw it. It would be very difficult to teach a fish to dance, but I suppose it is possible to imagine the fish had legs, and to discuss what steps it would require to teach it.

So, I shall excuse myself from the discussion and allow all of the others that have put forth their opinions to continue.

Cady Goldfield
23rd August 2013, 01:34
Folks,
While it's acceptable to attack an opinion, please refrain from making insulting comments aimed at a person or persons. Thanks.

Joseph Svinth
23rd August 2013, 03:23
Chris --

It is quite possible that you are taking a Hawaiian attitude toward this. I used to talk to a lot of Nisei about martial art topics, and their basic consensus was that (with the exception of things that are essentially meaningless in any language), if you couldn't describe the technique in English, using English words, then you didn't really know what it meant.

And, as far as the aiki mumbo-jumbo, there is always the translation of Ueshiba's speech in Hawaii. Ueshiba rambled on, speaking his usual nonsense, and the Hawaiian translator (a young Nonaka Sensei) said, "I have no idea what he just said, but when I am his age, I hope to be as wise," and the crowd applauded. Ueshiba then turned to Tohei and said, in Japanese, "How come you can't translate as well as this young man? You translate what I say, and they all look confused, but when he translates, they understand perfectly."

That said, if an organization is going to call itself aikido, then the official language of command and exhibition is going to be Japanese. In boxing, the official language is English. Why? Because that is what the organizations associated with international sport have decreed.

All my way of saying, who cares? I know an aiki school without many uniforms or any Japanese language instruction that the Japanese visit and go away from saying, "OMG, this is just like Japan," and another with the most beautiful dojo you've ever seen, everybody in uniform like good little soldiers, and who get mad when you just stand there waiting for their nikyo to start hurting or something.

Chris Li
23rd August 2013, 04:03
That said, if an organization is going to call itself aikido, then the official language of command and exhibition is going to be Japanese. In boxing, the official language is English. Why? Because that is what the organizations associated with international sport have decreed.

I'm not from Hawaii, so I'm not sure about the first part - anyway, here's the part that I disagree with. There is no official language in Aikido - just as there is no official language in the United States, just custom. There aren't even united organizations in Aikido that would be capable of making such an agreement at this point - for that matter, there's not even an agreement on the terminology in Japanese, different organizations often used different terms.

Best,

Chris

Joseph Svinth
23rd August 2013, 04:47
You might want to check with SportAccord on that. There is an official aikido. Everybody else? Vernacular art. Really. Why does what SportAccord think matter? It doesn't, unless your organization is interested in getting international recognition. Then it could.

As for Hawaii, given that you list a Hawaii location for yourself, I had thought it possible that perhaps you had met a Buddhahead at some point, and been influenced by his or her worldview. It happens, you know.

Chris Li
23rd August 2013, 05:02
You might want to check with SportAccord on that. There is an official aikido. Everybody else? Vernacular art. Really. Why does what SportAccord think matter? It doesn't, unless your organization is interested in getting international recognition. Then it could.

As for Hawaii, given that you list a Hawaii location for yourself, I had thought it possible that perhaps you had met a Buddhahead at some point, and been influenced by his or her worldview. It happens, you know.

The IAF is a member of the SportAccord framework, but many organizations - even Aikikai organizations, are not IAF members (most of the US Aikido organizations aren't, for example). In any case the Aikikai (which is different from the IAF) is far from the only Aikido organization, whatever SportAccord may think.

Best,

Chris

P Goldsbury
28th August 2013, 13:33
Neil,

That is exactly what I am getting at. I do some arts where it is important how you move your hands when you bow because it is an outward signal of what kind of attitude you are to be carrying internally. How you move your hands when you bow doesn't have to be that important, but in some arts it is. I was hoping to get into a discussion of what is important in various arts. It seems though that aikido (and likely karate) have become so diffused by the innumerable splits that have happened that they are huge classes of things that include so much variation they may not really be suitable for this discussion.

Mr Boylan,

I am the chief instructor of an aikido dojo in Hiroshima. With two German colleagues I teach the art mainly to Japanese. The art is taught in Japanese and at present the only non-Japanese student is a Frenchman who has migrated from Yoshinkan, but we have had foreign students, notably US Marines from the base at Iwakuni.

I sometimes ask myself why our dojo is attractive to our Japanese students (we are fairly well established and recently celebrated our tenth anniversary). All the Japanese cultural trappings are there, except for the fact that the instructors are foreign. In fact, we have called the dojo the Hiroshima Kokusai Dojo. We have not done any surveys, but I am fairly sure that our students believe that they are practising the Japanese martial art in an authentic way, so that they can go to another dojo elsewhere and continue their training without any problems.

So I tend to agree with the sentiments expressed in your blog, with the proviso that making absolute judgments here is difficult. Aikido comes in many flavours and I think a good way of looking at the art is via Wittgenstein's idea of family resemblance. Wittgenstein was discussing the defining characteristics of games and suggested that all games had a number of features such that they could be called games, but not all games had the same features. So there was no hard and fast rule for deciding the cut-off point between a game and a non-game, or for deciding which features of a game were more central and which were more peripheral. I think the same thing applies to what may be called a cultural activity and we also have to consider the added features of history, previous practice and teachers.

Best wishes,

Ellis Amdur
31st August 2013, 01:11
I visited a Kashima Shin-ryu "dojo" where the practice was outside - in the middle of a busy university quadrangle. They acted as if they were in a bubble of invisibility. They had bokuto. They were dressed in shorts, sweatshirts, and did a zarei - in the direction of the sun, IIRC. I was at the Maniwa Nen-ryu dojo in Maniwa village. Kids came to class wearing banlon sports sweats. One thing to be remembered about clothing, at least, is that until very recently, practitioners wore their daily wear. There was no keiko-gi. In fact, the judo-gi was a fireman's jacket, chosen because people's daily wear got too damaged.

Guy Buyens
31st August 2013, 08:41
I was at the Maniwa Nen-ryu dojo in Maniwa village. Kids came to class wearing banlon sports sweats.

Yes, these kids, still do Maniwa Nen-ryu wearing sports wear. Nevertheless students of Maniwa Nen-ryu also know how to dress up when doing embu.

Last time when our soke visited my house we (soke, 1 other member of HYR and myself) started a discussion on a technique which ended in almost one hour of training. None of us had special wear. This doesn’t mean that we are not supposed to put on our hakama properly when we come along to let say the Nippon budokan for an embu or even a formal training (although I have to admit that one day, coming from Tokyo by train immediately to the dojo in jeans and t-shirt, soke told me to take off my socks, pick a bo and join the class for the remaining 15 minutes).
At least when involved in a koryu, you belong to a school, therefore you have to invest in aspects that go beyond the pure technical aspects of the art. This means following the rules of that school or leave the school and do something else.

Gendai budo are may-be different in that there is no more a unique authority to define what the boundaries are. But this doesn’t relate to what people wear. In karate (which I did for at least some 35 years), I now observe people doing over stylized forms in competition, which they still call kata. And yes they wear impeccable white karate-gi.

For me the clothes as such are less important, the essence is. However, if to learn the essence, we are expected to learn how to dress, speak, behave,… then are we not more than willing to do an effort?

Cady Goldfield
31st August 2013, 14:54
Most traditional sports have specific attire that even modern participants continue to wear (for example, the formal breeches, ascot, boots, cap and jacket of European-style equestrians). Most of the uniforms or dress we see today evolved from practical garments that protected the wearer or reflected what was the daily attire worn at the time the sport or discipline was created. The fireman's jacket used as judo-wear, that Ellis pointed out, is another example of adapting a garment for sport/discipline use out of pure pragmatism; it became "tradition" later, after years of use. But it could just have been a jacket from another workman's trade, if that's all that had been available.

IMO, the continuity of attire, language and cultural courtesies in many disciplines, including arts such as aikido, lends to a sense of stepping out of the ordinary workaday world, into a rarified environment in which we shift our thoughts and focus from the "outside" world to an inner world and life. In that respect, clothing (and changing into it, from street clothes) becomes part of a meditation. The other trappings of the discipline... rei, terminology, etc. ... are also part of that parcel. As long as one doesn't get caught up in the minutiae of the trappings, to the detriment of actually focusing on training the martial skills themselves, then it can be a powerful tool for inculcating mindfulness and awareness, which are, IME, essential to heightening one's effectiveness.

I don't think it's necessary to have the cultural trappings of a classical tradition to successfully train in a martial discipline, and for some individuals it may even be distracting to learning the actual skills (i.e. watching the pointing finger, rather than the glorious moon that the finger is pointing to), but if we are mindful of what we are doing, and why, then it becomes a part of the training methodology, and is thus beneficial.